United States - Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) Technologies

Description

Added: Apr 24, 2019 5:42 pm

1. GENERAL INFORMATION:
Document Type: Request for Information
Posted Date: 4/24/2019
The NASA Shared Services Center (NSSC) is conducting market research on behalf of the GSA technical authority. NASA will not be the contracting agent. Please contact the GSA Technical Point of Contact listed in paragraph 8 of this Sources Sought Notice.

2. DESCRIPTION:
Sources Sought Notice (herein referred to as a Request for Information) are issued on behalf of the General Services Administration (GSA) in performing market research to determine industry interest, best practices, and capabilities and availability. This is a Request for Information announcement only. This is not a solicitation or request for proposal and in no way commits the Government to award a contract. The Government does not intend to award a contract(s) based solely on the submission of this Request for Information nor does it intend to pay for any costs incurred in response to this announcement. The GSA reserves the right to terminate this request and change its requirements and/or timeline if needed. Responding to this notice does not guarantee participation in future GSA activities. Original Tier 1 Hyper-converged Infrastructure (HCI) technology providers, henceforth known throughout this document as "Provider/s" failing to respond with a completed response to this RFI cannot participate in any subsequent solicitation(s) associated with this RFI, should one be released.
Responses to this RFI will only be accepted from Tier 1 HCI technology providers. However, any authorized reseller shall be permitted to respond to any subsequent solicitation on the accepted software configurations resulting from this RFI. The RFI data will be used to determine the most appropriate solution to meet GSA-IT needs.

3. SCOPE:
The GSA-IT organization is performing market research for HCI technologies. The requirements for this initiative are defined as a complete hardware and software solution suite that will meet the organization's need for providing a standard compute, storage, and hybrid cloud platform for GSA data centers and Regional Office Buildings (ROB). GSA-IT is interested in proven, production solutions that provide innovative hybrid cloud and automated service management. Due to program scheduling constraints, this process must be completed under the compressed timeline shown in the following table:

TABLE 1: RFI Timeline
April 24 - RFI Released
May 13 - Tier 1 providers who plan to participate must respond and identify dedicated sales and technical points of contact (name and telephone numbers). Tier 1 providers shall provide a written response demonstrating capabilities able to meet the requirements listed within this RFI. Responses should be made to Justin Noel
May 17 - GSA-IT shall release questions back to Tier 1 providers
May 27 - Tier 1 providers will provide final responses.

4. OBJECTIVE:
GSA-IT is assessing available HCI solution to:
   ● Reduce the hardware footprint in GSA's core datacenter
   ● Improve efficiency of administration and maintenance
   ● Improve automation and hybrid cloud services (on-prem and integration with cloud service providers
      like AWS, GCP, and Azure).
5. GSA-IT HCI SIZING REQUIREMENTS
Configuration 1 (Small - Remote Office):
Small - Remote Office Resource Requirements
Category Minimum Requirement Comments
Usable CPU Equivalent 4 X Intel E5-2620v4
Usable RAM 128GB Available in N+1 scenario
Usable Storage 5TB
Usable Storage I/O 1100
10Gbps SFP Ports 0
1Gbps UTP Ports 4 per node N+1 NICs
1Gbps OOB Management Port 1
N+1 Power Supply (110-240VAC) 2
Maximum RU 2
Physical Error Display (CPU, RAM, Pwr, etc.) Error lights

Configuration 2 (Medium - Remote Office):
Medium - Remote Office Resource Requirements
Category Minimum Requirement Comments
Usable CPU Equivalent 4 X Intel E5-2620v4
Usable RAM 256GB
Usable Storage 8TB
Usable Storage I/O 1100
10Gbps SFP Ports 0
1Gbps UTP Ports 4 per node N+1 NICs
1Gbps OOB Management Port 1
N+1 Power Supply (110-240VAC) 2
Maximum RU 2
Physical Error Display (CPU, RAM, Pwr, etc.) Error Lights
Configuration 3 (Data Center):
Data Center Resource Requirements
Category Minimum Requirement Comments
Usable CPU Equivalent 26 X Intel e5-2699v4 -22 cores
Usable RAM 14TB
Usable Storage 440TB
Usable Storage I/O 10000
10Gbps SFP Ports 2 NICs (2 X 10Gbps per node) Must support N+1
1Gbps UTP Ports 4 per node
1Gbps OOB Management Port 1
N+1 Power Supply (110-240VAC) 2
Maximum RU Not to exceed 26
Physical Error Display (CPU, RAM, Pwr, etc.) Error Lights
6. GSA-IT SOULTION REQUIREMENTS:
Providers are asked to respond to Attachment A (Solution Requirements) by filling in the appropriate cell.
7. ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:
   ● A holistic approach should be detailed in provider responses. This includes hardware, software, and any
      ancillary services needed to accommodate the requirements listed in attachment A. All required 
      hardware and software should be referenced in the answers provided in attachment A and
      associated capability statement.
   ● A key factor in this RFI is accommodating a hybrid cloud management solution. The provider shall
      describe the ability to manage hybrid cloud which includes both on-premise and cloud services (native
      AWS, Azure, and GCP integration).
   ● Equipment, Software, and services must be TAA compliant
   ● Vendor EPEAT (epeat.net) information
8. MARKET RESEARCH - REQUEST FOR INFORMATION (Capability Statement):
   ● The Provider's Request for Information (Capability Statement) Response should be concise and
      focused and not exceed 10 pages including cover pages, table of contents etc. Primary text must not be
      less than 10 point font.
   ● Sales brochures, videos, and other marketing materials are not solicited and will not be reviewed.
   ● Budgetary price Pricing information is requested for the specified configurations, but will not be
      considered an official quote.
   ● Interested companies shall submit an electronic copy of their Capability Statements via email to GSA
      Procurement POC at justin.noel@GSA.gov. The due date and time for submission of responses is
      provided in Table 1 above.
   ● No inquiries related to this Request for Information may be initiated by phone. All such inquiries shall be
      initiated via e-mail.
9. CAPABILITY STATEMENT REQUIREMENTS
Requested Content:
Company and Contact Information:
   1. Company Name and Address;
   2. Contact Name, Title, Phone Number, Fax Number, and e-mail Address; and
   3. General Services Administration (GSA) HCI RFI 2019.

Capabilities: Business
Providers must provide the following:
   1. A summary of the provider's understanding of the following
       ● Scope of the RFI
       ● Associated Timeline
       ● GSA-IT's HCI Requirements
   2. Brand names of all products or clearly indicate that the product is an equal product to a particular
       brand name.
   3. A narrative description of the provider's proposed solution to meet GSA-IT's requirements for both of
       the Options described.
10.EVALUATION REQUIREMENTS:
INSTRUCTIONS
Please use the following instructions to complete attachment A. Each set of instructions below is based on a tab within the Attachment A spreadsheet.

   1. Provider Information - The provider shall enter the information related to your company and contact
       information. This information will be used to associate attachment A to the written response.
   2. Solution Requirements - The provider shall provide a response to the "Provider Meets?" and "Provider
       Solution Description fields".
       ● Provider Meets - Please select "yes" if the requirement is met, "no" if the requirement is not met, and
          "N/A" if the solution is not applicable to the Provider solution.
       ● Provider Solution Description - In a couple of sentences, please describe how the requirement is met,
           not met, or not applicable based on the provider solution.
   3. Hardware Offering - The provider shall provide configuration information to comply with the four
       referenced options in section 6 (GSA-IT HCI SIZING REQUIREMENTS). Provider may modify the
       format, but must include the fields specified.
   4. Software Offering - The provider shall provide software and licensing information necessary to comply
       with the scope, objective, and requirements within this RFI. Provider may modify the format, but must
       include the fields specified.

Opportunity closing date

13 May 2019

Value of contract

to be confirmed